You'll find plenty of companies making waves at at SXSW this year. And speakers from Lena Dunham to Spike Lee and Karlie Kloss to Chelsea Manning will be sharing their insights with attendees, including tales of Hollywood controversies and the future of digital.
More importantly though, SXSW is where Texas startups continue to make their mark and reach broader audiences. From here in Austin, to our neighbors in Dallas and Houston, here are a few Texas startups that will make noise during SXSW.
Austin
EverlyWell
Most recently, this home health kits startup made headlines for receiving the largest investment of any female-led company on ABC's "Shark Tank" ($1 million line of credit with shark Lori Greiner, also her largest investment on the show). More importantly, they are changing the game when it comes to women’s health. EverlyWell allows customers to order a variety of women’s health tests from their website, and rather than go through the arduous process of insurance, customers can pay an upfront cost and get their lab tests. EverlyWell’s user base is about 75 percent female, but offers tests like the food sensitivity test and STD test for everyone.
Where to find them: CEO Julia Cheek will speak on an interesting panel with other Austin startups Phlur (featured here) and Localuer entitled “Digital Natives Disrupting Time-Honored Industries."
re:3D
Ever seen the 3D printer at Capital Factory and desired your own? Enter re:3D, founded by Samantha Snabes, a former social entrepreneur-in-residence at NASA. The Gigabot, the startup’s flagship product, is an award-winning technology that can print objects up to 30x larger than competing desktop models. Gigabot is already sold in more than 50 countries.
Where to find them: Snabes has her own session called “The Future is Garbage: 3D Printing from Recycled Plastic." She'll also be at WeWork Congress on Monday from 3 to 6 p.m. for an office hours meetup to share insights on winning a WeWork Creator Award.
GrubTubs
It’s a disappointing fact, but restaurants throw away plenty of food throughout the day. GrubTubs transforms that food into sustainable animal feed for local farmers, saving restaurants money on trash bills in the process. The team is no stranger to creativity and food sustainability, as CEO Robert Olivier worked in the world of insect technology, and COO Ashley King founded Dysh App, which connects foodies worldwide.
Where to find them: GrubTubs is a finalist in the Hyper-Connected Communities Technology category at the SXSW Accelerator Pitch Event.
Dallas
FastVisa US
With a potential ban on citizens traveling from certain countries, one Dallas company has risen above the fray to help improve the immigration conundrum for workers. FastVisa provides a low-cost platform for helping workers and the organizations that sponsor them improve their immigration workflow, helping to cast aside paperwork errors, case backlogs, and other snafus that can delay an immigration timeline. FastVisa was also accepted into the Capital Factory accelerator program, allowing it to work out of the Dallas Entrepreneur Center, and has raised over $300,000 -- much of that from investors, friends and family who were also immigrants.
Entrepreneurs Paul Kang and Ethan Jeong founded the platform after working at The Given, an on-demand edtech platform for higher education.
Where to find them: FastVisa is the only startup from North Texas pitching investors at the SXSW Pitch Accelerator Event.
Houston
Future Sight AR
Augmented and virtual reality are changing the game in a variety of industries, and the Future Sight AR team is developing augmented reality applications for one industry that’s a stalwart of Clutch City: engineering companies in the oil and gas world. Future Sight AR’s technology helps construction firms with a variety of tasks, including project visualization, scheduling, and helping to train employees with AR simulations.
The startup was founded by Lori-Lee Emshey, who came from the energy industry, and has lived on every continent. The company boasts women in all leadership roles as well.
Where to find them: Future Sight AR is an alternate in the Augmented and Virtual Reality Technologies category at the SXSW Accelerator Pitch Event.
